Israel: UN Official Calls for "Immediate Actions on the Ground" to Save Peace Process

On Tuesday, the United Nations' Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affairs Haile Menkerios declared that political efforts for a negotiated two-State solution have reached “a deep and worrying impasse”.

Menkerios said the absence of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations and Israel’s refusal to freeze settlements pose a key challenge which call for “immediate actions on the ground” to prevent Middle East peace efforts from unravelling. Referring to Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas's statement that he would not take part in the forthcoming elections, the senior UN official warned, "This is a loud and clear wake-up call. If we cannot move decisively forward to a final status agreement, we risk sliding backwards, with both the Palestinian Authority and the two-State solution itself imperilled."

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Menkerios criticized Israel for restraining rather than freezing settlement activity, pointing to the approval of 900 more housing units to expand Gilo settlement in East Jerusalem. He added that, in the past month, Israel demolished 17 houses and displaced 99 Palestinians, more than half of them children. More than 70 Palestinians were also injured and more than 300 arrested during Israeli raids in the West Bank, he said.

Menkerios also criticized Israel for its continuing blockade in Gaza, noting its counter-productive effects. He stated that the UN has yet to receive a satisfactory response from Israel to a six-month old proposal to complete $77 million of stalled housing, school, and health projects.

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Speaking to Ma'ariv, Israel's Industry, Trade, and Labor Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer (Labor Party) said over the weekend:

In the current sociopolitical situation, only a leader from the Right could pass a peace process through the nation.

[Prime Minister Menachem] Begin returned the Sinai. Could a Labor leader do that? Could a Labor leader have dared evacuate Gaza and destroy the settlements?

[Prime Minister Yitzhak] Rabin was killed just for Oslo [1993 accords with the Palestine Liberation Organization]. Does anyone think I could have evacuated Gaza? Only a leader from the Right could bring such a change. There is nothing we can do. That's the reality. Take it or leave it.

In Ben-Eliezer's mind, the relationship between Israeli right and left is almost independent from each other. The left can show no progress while the right has given all the "concessions" for the sake of the peace process. Indeed, he accused Labor of having a "self-destructive virus" and of failing to develop a new generation of leaders.

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Ben-Eliezer praised Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the close relationship between the premier and Defense Minister Ehud Barak:

Bibi wants to advance the diplomatic process with the Palestinians more than any leader I know. Despite the pressure he faces, he makes an effort day and night to reach a breakthrough.

Bibi and Barak broadcast the same language. They understand each other. They complete each other.

When asked why the public was heading toward the right, he said that "the nation is tired" and "sick of the Arabs."

The story is not ending up at here. Ben-Eliezer is answering the question of Haaretz's Yitzhak Laor, "Why has the left in Israel vanished?" In his analysis, Laor see the secular-religious consensus in the alliance between Netanyahu and Barak today. Against intimidations and pressures on this consensus, in which religious observers ignore the rights of Palestinians due to "the given rights from God" and secular people ignore the same rights because Israel is militarily and economically more powerful, he accues the masses of being obedient and afraid to oppose their leaders.

How can Mr. Ben-Eliezer explain Netanyahu's decision on declaring Jerusalem as "the eternal capital of Israel" and his insistence on "the natural growth" in the West Bank settlements? This scene is one of the suffering of the "left" in Israel, as elsewhere, since the demise of the Soviet Union and since the post-9/11 era's securitizing atmosphere. Israel can now claim a golden age to embed its policies into aggressive actions, as it did during the offensive in Gaza, and/or to play the "three monkeys", as it is doing right now on the settlements issue.

Is there any chance that the dead can come to life through resistance, as Laor argues, or are we now bound to invest our hopes in the Netanyahu-Barak alliance?

Israel-Palestine: Peres Says Settlements Halt When Peace Talks Start

On Sunday, Israeli President Shimon Peres met with his Egyptian counterpart Hosni Mubarak in Cairo. Peres stated that Israel was ready to stop settlement construction in the West Bank as soon as negotiations with Palestinians started:

The minute we shall start to negotiate there won't be new settlements, there won't be confiscation of land. Unfortunately, it's a marginal issue; it is some building of houses that became a central issue for the wrong reasons. My answer is even this issue can be settled by negotiations and agreement.

Asked about Peres's words regarding settlements, Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said that he was unaware of any new peace initiative, as he appointed the former ambassador to the United Nations, Yitzhak Levanon, as Israel's new envoy to Cairo.

Lieberman may be trying to ameliorate his personal image in Cairo through a new accommodation but Peres's dovish statement is still far from satisfying the people of the region. There was no clarification whether his promise would include a full halt of construction, given Israel's standard condition of "natural growth". Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated Peres's words so far yet he also emphasized that Jerusalem and "natural growth" would not be included in any deal with the Palestinians.

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Following Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Washington visit, the Jerusalem Municipal Planning Committee approved the construction plan for an additional 900 new housing units beyond the Green Line. Questions remains over the timing and actors in this decision: is the Netanyahu Government involved? And, if so, is this primarily a message to Washington that Israel is not weak or is it prompted by internal politics, trying to consolidate opposition to any demands of the Obama Administration?

There is another possibility: the approval of the additional 900 housing units may be a harbinger of a halt to expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, at least temporarily. Before declaring that halt, Netanyahu is seeking space for a guarantee that East Jerusalem will not be item in future discussions.  If Jerusalem is non-negotiable, then Israel will not build as Arabs offer gestures of "normalization". If this is not conceded, then Israel will resume settlement construction.

On Wednesday, "left-wing" politician Yossi Beilin told Army Radio that Netanyahu is soon going to announce a complete freeze in West Bank settlement construction for 10 months. Israeli officials have not responded to this claim.

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President Barack Obama spoke to Fox News on Wednesday and called Israel's decision to expand settlements in East Jerusalem "dangerous".

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1GFgvzT7Y8[/youtube]

Obama said:

The situation in the Middle East is very difficult, and I've said repeatedly and I'll say again, Israel's security is a vital national interest to the United States, and we will make sure they are secure.

I think that additional settlement building does not contribute to Israel's security. I think it makes it harder for them to make peace with their neighbors. I think it embitters the Palestinians in a way that could end up being very dangerous.